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Well bless their souls, the holy rollers have had a sudden change of heart about illegal immigrants.

A groundswell of biblical reasoning about compassion has swept the conservative Protestant congregations.

Apparently, God wants the faithful to maybe take a less righteous stance in particular to the 11 or 12 million souls from south of our borders who have taken up residence here without proper papers.

This sounds like a miracle to the the liberal Christians - yes, some have managed to exist in cracks and dark corners.

This one came like a flash of insight, a sun ray through the clouds following an epic storm.

Hallelujah!

The stiff-backed, dour,

brimstone-scarred moralists have softened toward their fellow, though unsanctioned, man who till now they had shunned with rather great

enthusiasm.

Now, suddenly, they have noticed passages in the Bible about compassion and helping others. Lo and behold, the New Testament gained relevance.

To what can we attribute all this quick change?

Alas, we more secular, cynical souls trace this to a date in November, the 6th to be exact.

Yes, sigh, to the presidential election. The hardcore conservative faithful discovered some inescapable data that declares that the party is over if they cannot find a way to embrace that large pool of voters known as Hispanics.

So they've taken on an effort akin to being born again, to seeing the immigration issue with fresh eyes, to opening those hearts in ways that will have the happy side consequence of attracting more votes in future elections.

The Republicans have panicked, in other words. God has spoken in demography. All those hard lines need to move, and soon. And so the memos, rediscovery of certain gospel, mental gymnastics and even some sermons about extending the community.

Frankly, while yes, it's easy to giggle at the obvious, I think this is a good thing. I've long thought that some (not all) of my more righteous friends could use a dose of humility. That's not a bad place to come from, and it does seem to be a tenet of the biblical Jesus and his donkey.

I'm all for it if we can finally get to sensible policies dealing with immigration and work visas.

And from here on, I promise to accept the miraculous change of heart among formerly obnoxious religious conservatives with a straight face.